No Longer Stressed Out
by UnattemptedFeat
Summary: Dean wished that Kat hadn't tried so hard to live up to the name 'Baby Sister'.
1. Double Back

**Author's Note** **: Hello, my peeps! I hope that everyone is having fun being gripped tight and raised from perdition.**

 **I hope you all had a great Thanksgiving. Mine was good. We had crab, pie, and coffee! Woo!**

 **I know that I have a fic like this in-progess for Sherlock, but I will honest with you all for a moment. Little John will probably never be finished. I go where my Muse points, and right now he is all over the place. You've probably seen my Muse around. He has long, dark hair and a black leather jacket. He rides a motorcycle.**

 **Muse likes to show up right around the time I need to be getting my PreCalculus homework done. He's annoying like that. But I love him anyways. I can't say no to his puppy eyes.**

 **Without further ado...**

Dean loaded the shotgun with the rock salt pellets. When he was done, he closed the trunk of the Impala. He walked over to where Sam and Kat were waiting by an oak tree, both armed and ready.

"Alright," Dean said. "Now we've just got to wait for nightfall." The three hunters glanced at the sun, which was slowly making its way down the pink sky.

The Winchesters were hunting a Shreve. Shreves were nasty, ugly things that hunted adults and turned them into toddlers, feeding on the youth of the de-aged. It had killed four hikers so far. The hunters hadn't bothered to try and explain the Shreve to the police, who believed that they had found the bodies of four actual children. It would just be too hard, and they would instantly be committed to the nearest mental facility. Been there, done that, and not looking for a repeat experience, thank you very much.

Kat plopped onto the ground, leaning back against the old oak. "I wish Shreves could materialize in daylight. That way we could kill it while it slept instead of waiting for it to come out of its hideout."

"Agreed," Sam said, sitting down beside his little sister. Dean nodded his own agreement.

Because you could only see Shreves by moonlight, the Winchesters had to wait until dark to hunt it in the woods where it roamed. After parking the Impala, they had closed off the road so that no more hikers would be hurt. Dean was of the opinion that it was really stupid to be hiking after dark, so he wasn't as sympathetic with the dead as Sam and Kat were.

"Okay, let's go," Dean couldn't see the sun anymore, and the sky was a very dark navy. "Time to gank this son of a bitch."

Dean led the way into the woods, Sam bringing up the rear to watch their backs. The hunters were thankful that Shreves had terrible eyesight, which meant that it would be unable to know that they had weapons. But it did have a fantastic sense of smell.

And a funny thing about a Shreve is that they like the smell of Chanel perfume.

That was why Dean, Sam, and Kat were trekking through the woods smelling like Giselle Bundchen. Dean had actually liked the scent (before being completely submerged in it, of course), and he had bought a bottle that he planned to give to Kat for Christmas.

The snap of a twig brought the hunters to a stop. Dean waited, hardly daring to breathe.

A small doe suddenly bounded out of the bushes next to them. Dean almost shot the damn thing, but he managed to keep his finger off the trigger.

"Was the Shreve corporeal?" Kat asked when they were walking again.

"Was it what?" Dean had no idea what that word meant.

"I think it was," Sam answered, ignoring Dean's question. Dean hated it when they did that.

Kat was nice, "I asked if it had a solid body."

"Oh, yeah it does," Without shining the flashlight on him, Dean could tell that Sam was wearing his _That's what I just said_ bitchface. Turning back to face the shadows of the trees, Dean remarked, "Kat rides shotgun on the way back to the bunker."

"Yes!" Kat exclaimed at the same time that Sam voiced his protest.

After another hour of walking, the hunters had still found nothing.

Finally, Dean had had enough, "Come out, you bastard! Here we are! Nice, juicy humans that smell like supermodels!" Dean's yell rang through the trees.

Dean waited to see what would happen. When nothing did, he glanced back at Sam and Kat.

"Guess n-" Suddenly, Dean was pulled roughly forward. He flew through the air and crashed hard into a tree. Shaking away the haze, he heard a gunshot and then a cry. Dean shoved himself up, whirling to find his dropped gun. Seeing it in the brush, he dove for it and scrambled up.

There was a glowing figure standing over a small bundle. Not seeing Sam or Kat behind the Shreve, Dean shot the thing into oblivion. It disapated with a harsh scream.

Looking around frantically, Dean shouted, "Sam! Kat! Where are you?"

A groan from his right got his attention. Sam was lying on the ground. The Shreve must have thrown him like he had Dean.

"Dean, did you get him?" Sam stood slowly, rubbing his shoulder.

"Yeah," Dean said quickly. "Where's Kat?"

"I don't know," Sam caught sight of the small bundle on the ground. "Oh, God. No..."

The brothers ran for the bundle, recognizing it as a heap of clothing.

Kat's clothing.

They knelt beside them. Dean reached to pull the top aside, and Sam scrunched his eyes shut, refusing to see the lifeless body of his sister.

Dean pulled the clothes aside. He gasped.

A toddler with long blonde hair was lying swaddled in the clothes. The child opened her eyes and looked up at Dean.

"Oh my God," Sam had cracked one eye open, but then both shot open at the sight.

"What?" It was Kat's voice. It was, but it was higher.

"The Shreve got you," Dean explained, looking down at his baby sister.

"What do you...? Oh," Kat looked down at herself.

Suddenly thankful that neither he nor Sam had picked up a flashlight yet, Dean told Kat, "Try to put your shirt on a bit." Out of habit, Dean and Sam looked away when the toddler sat up to put the shirt on.

"Alright," Kat said. "I'm as decent as I'm going to get."

The brothers gathered the guns and flashlights, and then the three hunters set off for the Impala. When Kat started to slow, on account of suddenly being four times smaller, Sam picked her up without a comment. He carried her back to the car.

After packing the trunk, Dean slid into the driver's seat. He was surprised to see that Sam wasn't in the passenger seat behind him.

"What are you doing back there?" Dean glanced at his brother in the rearview mirror. Sam was holding Kat in his lap, a seatbelt over them both.

"She's like three, Dean," Sam reminded him. "And we don't have a carseat. If you get in an accident, I don't want her to fly through the windshield."

A little annoyed that he hadn't thought of that himself, Dean drove off.


	2. Back On Our Heels

**Author's Note** **: Bonjour, good peoples! I hope that everyone is doing well.**

 **Here it is...the second chapter.**

 **Yeah!**

 **Without further ado...**

The Winchesters rode back to the bunker in silence. Dean wasn't even blaring his usual Metallica or Black Sabbath.

Sam's mind was going over the possibilities for the future.

What would happen if Kat couldn't be changed back? What if she would be little forever? What would they do with her? They couldn't take a child on hunts.

Sam remembered when Kat had been little the first time around. He had been twelve when her mother had dumped the two year-old with the Winchester boys. At the beginning, John and Dean had been unsure whether or not to just drop the child off at a church. Sam, on the other hand, had instantly loved Kat. When she was too young to hunt, Sam had always volunteered to stay behind and watch her. Not only did it give Kat some company, but Sam was also to focus more on his schoowork.

Kat was eight when Sam went to Stanford. When he left, Kat had still been a child. When she and Dean came to get him when John went missing, Kat was a hunter.

It always hurt Sam when he thought about how he'd missed those four years of Kat's life. She had been the hardest to leave behind. Sam had practically raised that girl for six years.

Sam had always wished that he could have protected Kat from the life of a hunter. It had even crossed his mind to take her with him to Stanford. But he had known that John and Dean would never have let her go. John had pretty much told Sam to never come back if he left.

Now, looking down at the three year-old Kat, Sam was grateful that Shreves fed on youth instead of innocence. It was fortunate that they did so that Kat still possessed her old memories. Sam wasn't sure what he and Dean would have done with an actual toddler. This one would be hard enough.

When Dean pulled the car to a stop outside of the bunker, Kat made to jump out of the car, but Sam held her tight.

"Hang on," Sam warned, opening the door. "You're tiny, remember?" He gently set Kat down on the ground himself.

As soon as they were all in the main room of the bunker, Dean called, "Cas!"

"Hello, Dean." The angel greeted. Seeing the miniature version of Kat, his eyes widened. "Did you steal this child?"

"What, no!" Dean cried indignantly. "Cas, it's Kat."

"Katherine?" Cas bent to the blonde toddler's level.

"Hey there, Cassie," Kat smiled sheepishly. "What's up?"

"What happened?"

"Run-in with a Shreve," Dean explained. Cas nodded knowingly. "Can you fix her?"

"Dean..." Cas shook his head. Sam's eyes widened.

"Cas, what is it?" Sam demanded. He was tempted to pick Kat up again and hold her close.

"It's just that I can't reverse the spell."

His words hung in the air ominously.

When Sam spoke, his voice was but a whisper, "You mean that she'll be a toddler forever?"

"Not at all," Castiel shrugged. "She'll only be like this for about a month. The spell will wear off by then."

Sam, Dean, and tiny Kat all let out a sigh of relief.

"God, Cas," Dean ran a hand through his hair. "We've got to work on your conversation skills."

The angel looked confused, but Dean just waved him away.

"What am I going to do for a month?" Kat glanced down at herself. "Like this."

"Don't worry about it, Kat," Sam assured her. "We'll just hang low in the bunker until you've changed back."

"We will?" Dean begged to differ. Sam elbowed him. Dean shrugged like _what_.

"No, keep hunting," Kat said, although her expressive toddler eyes spoke differently. "I'll be fine on my own. I'll call when I'm normal again."

"We're not going to leave you alone," Sam protested. "We can hold off the hunting for a few weeks."

"We can?" Dean asked again.

"Dean, shut up!" Sam hissed, elbowing him even harder.

"Sam, it's fine," Kat insisted. "Keep hunting Lucifer. He is way more important than this."

Sam had a different opinion. He was afraid that Lucifer would somehow find about Kat's predicament and take advantage of it. Now, when Kat couldn't defend herself, he could take his vessel much more easily. Kat was vulnerable like this. Though she still had to say yes, Kat was much more susceptible to Lucifer in this state.

At the mention of Lucifer, Dean seemed to finally get what Sam was thinking. His expression changed, "You know what, though? We could definitely use a break. A nice vacation is just what we need."


	3. Back in Black

**Author's Note** **: Hello, ma peeps! I hope that everyone is having a good day/night/whatever!**

 **So I've made a list of every single fic I have that is incomplete, and I'm trying to update all of them. Even the ones that I haven't even touched or thought about in almost a year.**

 **So, wish me luck.**

 **Without further ado...**

It had only been four days, but Kat was so ready to be sixteen again. Sam seemed to actually be enjoying himself, getting to catch up on research and all that. But Dean was growing more and more restless every day, and Kat was right there with him.

Every night, Cas would appear and give them an update on exactly how much havoc Lucifer was wreaking on the planet. And every night, Kat would once again beg Sam and Dean to get back in the fight. She argued that she would be just fine at the bunker, and that the world needed them more than she did.

Kat knew that Dean agreed with her, but he never went against Sam's insistence that they were going to stay.

On the fourth night, when Cas came to give his update, Kat cornered him in the hall.

"Cas, I need you to start helping me convince them to go fight Lucifer," Kat went straight to the punch.

"I agree with Sam and Dean, Katherine," Cas shook his head. "Even with the bunker's fortifications, we are up against the devil himself. I would rather not chance you being here alone."

"Then let's call Bobby," Kat suggested. "Call Jody. Hell, call Garth. Ask one of them to stay with me for a little while so that Sam and Dean can get back out there."

Castiel deliberated that for a moment, "I'm sorry, Katherine. The only solution I would allow is if I was the one to stay with you, but do you think Sam and Dean would agree?"

"You would really do that?" Kat smiled gratefully. "I think they would be just fine with it. It's mostly Sam I need to convince anyhow, and you're an angel of the Lord, so how can he refuse?"

And Kat was right, Sam didn't refuse. After they'd won him over, Dean just said, "Sam, pack your crap. We leave in fifteen."

"Please be careful," Kat told her brothers as they were walking out the door. "Call every night and give us an update. And if you need Cassie, just pray for him."

"We're always careful," Sam smiled wryly. "And we will be back soon. If we aren't, we certainly will be back to get you when you're big again."

"Promise?" Kat asked.

"Promise," Dean chimed in. With that, the Winchester boys left.

It was nearing ten pm, so Kat figured it was a good time to set her plan in action. She told Cas she was going to bed, and he just nodded.

As she went to her room, Kat remembered the dream she had had two nights before.

 _Kat faced Lucifer without fear, knowing that it was only a dream. He just smirked at her._

 _"You haven't seen me in real life, Katherine Winchester," Lucifer sneered cheerily. "You just wait. I'm a big, bad wolf. And I'm gonna blow all the houses down."_

 _"Not if we have anything to say about it," Kat shot back defiantly._

 _"Oh, we'll see about that," Lucifer chuckled. "But first, I have a little deal for you."_

 _"I'm not making any deals with you!" Kat snapped instantly._

 _"You may want to hear me out on this one," Lucifer put his hands up in surrender. "It could save a lot of people. It could save dear old Sammy and Dean-o."_

 _Kat cursed silently as Lucifer pressured her exactly where he knew it would work. Seeing her reluctant look, Lucifer continued, "So I've got a little proposition for you, Katherine Winchester. There's something I need you to do for me while you're small. And in return, I will close the gates of Hell."_

 _"Why would you want to do that?" Kat asked, a little surprised. Weren't demons helpful to the Devil himself._

 _"Demons are sloppy, and I hate them," Lucifer stated. "They have no concept of style!"_

 _Kat rolled her eyes, "So what would I have to do?"_

 _"Simple," Lucifer began, making Kat think that it definitely wasn't simple. "All you have to do is kill a demon called Mordecai. He would be the most against my idea to close the gates of Hell, and he would just get in my way. So kill him, I close the gates, and we can go back to fighting and hating each other's measly, black guts later."_

And Kat had taken the deal. But after she killed this demon, whether Lucifer actually closed the gates of Hell or not, Kat was still going to attempt to gank Lucifer. Sure, the Colt hadn't worked, but Kat was just going to be armed with an angel blade.

The angel blade she had just slipped from Castiel's trench coat.

Kat closed her bedroom door behind her and went to her phone. She quickly sent the text and waited patiently for the King of Hell to appear.

She only had to wait about ten seconds before Crowley showed up. Luckily, she had remembered to deactivate the 'demon alarms' so the bunker didn't go berzerk.

"Evening, Katarina," Crowley greeted. "Ready for our night stroll?"

What Kat loved about Crowley was that all she had to do was ask him to bust her out of the bunker, and he agreed without even asking why.

"I am," Kat took Crowley's arm, and he teleported them out of the bunker.

"I would offer to get a car for you," Crowley said as they landed in Blue Ridge, Montana. "But I'm not sure you could reach the pedals."

"Shut up, Crowley," Kat shoved him playfully, which really didn't work all that well. But at least Crowley was fairly short.

"Really, Katarina," Crowley said, "why did you need to escape your angellic shadow? I'm sure you two could've had a grand time playing Monopoly."

"Just needed a break," Kat lied smoothly. "I've been cooped up in the bunker as a toddler for like five days now. Toddlers are restless."

"Liar," Crowley retorted. "What are we hiding from big brothers and winged trench coats, Katarina?"

"It's nothing you should concern yourself with."

"It does, however, seem like something Sam and Dean would be concerned with," Crowley pointed out.

Kat just turned around and started walking away. She figured she would probably have to backtrack to find the coordinates that Lucifer had given her for Mordecai, but at the moment she didn't care.

"Katarina!" Crowley called after her, annoyed.

But he didn't follow.


End file.
